The Road to Sitcom Hell

The Writers Guild of America West scores with this irreverent (you’ll see what we mean) interview with EPISODES creators David Crane and Jeffrey Klarik:

Showtime-Episodes

The Road to Sitcom Hell
by Denis Faye

Episodes’ David Crane & Jeffrey Klarik riff on why they’re still scripting the Hollywood-skewering comedy all by themselves and why they’ll never, ever, go back to writing for network. read article

Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 1/23/14

Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are=&0=&Tara Butters & Michele Fazekas (DOLLHOUSE) are creating/writing/producing AGENT CARTER, a spinoff of the CAPTAIN AMERICA character for, natch ABC. (And it better be better than AGENTS OF SHIELD, you hear me? Do ya? I mean it! Cuz there’s just so much disappointment a Marvel Maniac can take, you know?) Thomas Kelly (COPPER) has signed a new overall deal with AMC to write/produce/develop/you know the drill TV stuff. (Kelly’s an amazing prose writer as well as a TV and film guy. In fact, he’s kind of my hero, so this is muy exciting.) Amy Poehler (PARKS AND RECREATION) has a new overall deal with NBC. Her first project is as co-creator of the tentatively titled OLD SOUL, a comedy about a woman trying to find herself by working with “a group of elderly people.” (Hoo, boy! More funny old folks! My grandparents can hardly wait! Although maybe that’ll be an inducement for them to stay alive. No, not to watch but so they can complain? Geema, whatcha think?) Jon Robin Baitz (BROTHERS & SISTERS) is writing THE SLAP, an NBC miniseries about “what happens when a man slaps another couple’s misbehaving child at a family BBQ.” (Am I wrong in thinking that this will either be intentionally hilarious as hell…or unintentionally hilarious as hell? See how I did that? Got this thing totally covered now.)

From Evaluation to Inspiration

In our data-conscious society, we do hella evaluation. Maybe it’s time for some inspiration instead?

(Hey, we kept a straight face through those two sentences. Awesome, huh? Oh, wait…)

inspiratonby Scott Barry Kaufman, Pd.D.

We live in a culture saturated with evaluation. read article

Leesa Dean: Adventures of a Web Series Newbie

spinal-tapChapter 42 – That Stonehenge Moment
by Leesa Dean

Intense week! In a good way. Been on a roll writing Season Two of the Lele Show. Tweaking, making changes and I hope people like it. Not putting deadlines in the mix–I have too much on my plate. But, hopefully, will be done writing all the episodes in about a month or month and a half (there are 36 new eps and an ADDITIONAL 36 pieces of supplemental stuff that have to be written/shaped.)

Also working on a two brand new shows I’m really excited about. And one is live action. They’re still in the development stages so it’s quite a juggling act: finding the time each day to work on The Lele Show, each of the two new shows, production on the TOP SECRET PROJECT and the few freelance gigs I have (just got a call for a very very cool one but it’s too soon to talk fully about it.)

Speaking of production on the TOP SECRET PROJECT: gearing up for two shoots. And one is this Sunday. So busy tweaking the script, speaking with my producing partner and finalizing tech stuff and speaking with the guy who’s doing Camera 2. read article

Nickelodeon Introducing Customizable Programming

Either it’s just another way to play the censorship game…or it’s an awesome new paradigm:

by Chris Morran

Streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime owe a good deal of their success to parents of young children, who love that they can dial up one of their kids’ favorite shows or movies instantly and without commercials. The folks at Viacom and Verizon are hoping to replicate some of that experience with a new customizable cable TV channel aimed at youngsters.dora-the-explorer

Rather than putting viewers at the mercy of TV programmers or forcing parents to find desired content online or via on-demand TV, “My Nick Jr.” will take a different approach by giving viewers a selection of seven different themes — like “get creative,” “word play,” or “supersonic science” — that will then determine the initial programming. Viewers can then vote yay or nay (via smile and frown icons) for individual shows. This feedback will then help customize the experience further. read article